[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 35, Number 40 (Monday, October 11, 1999)]
[Pages 1932-1933]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on the Legislative Agenda

October 6, 1999

    Good afternoon. I want to say a few brief words about three critical 
issues now pending before Congress. There have been major developments 
on all of them in the last 24 hours that demand our attention and the 
attention of the American people.
    First, yesterday's defeat of Ronnie White's nomination for the 
Federal district court judgeship in Missouri was a disgraceful act of 
partisan politics. Once again, this creates a real doubt about the 
Senate's ability to fairly perform its constitutional duty to advise and 
consent.
    Unfortunately, by voting down the first African-American judge, who 
was already serving--the first African-American judge to serve on the 
Missouri State Supreme Court, the Republican-controlled Senate is adding 
credence to the perceptions that they treat minority and women judicial 
nominees unfairly and unequally.
    I would just point out that that strict party-line vote included 
Republicans who had previously voted in the Judiciary Committee to 
recommend him to the full Senate.
    I hope the Senate leadership will reverse this course and begin to 
provide timely and fair consideration of all judicial nominees. In 
particular, I ask the Senate to act on the nominations of Marsha Berzon 
and Richard Paez, who has been held up for years now. They're both 
excellent candidates for the Ninth Circuit and have been waiting for 
quite some time to receive a vote from the Senate.
    Meanwhile, I will continue to fulfill my obligations to nominate and 
press for the confirmation of the most qualified candidates possible for 
the Federal bench.
    The second thing I want to talk about is congressional action on the 
Patients' Bill of Rights. Today was supposed to be the day the American 
people have long waited for, the day a bipartisan majority passed a 
strong Patients' Bill of Rights. Now, the Republican leadership knows 
there is a majority for that bill. But unfortunately, as a result of an 
11th hour appeal by the insurance industry lobbyists, which all of you 
reported on yesterday,

[[Page 1933]]

once again it appears that the will of the American people will be 
thwarted.
    In the dead of the night last night the House leaders concocted a 
process filled with enough poison pills and legislative sleights of hand 
to practically guarantee the defeat of this bill. This is a travesty. 
It's the sort of thing they did to kill commonsense gun legislation in 
the aftermath of Littleton. The American people want something; there is 
a bipartisan majority for it; the leadership makes a deal with the 
special interest and figures out some procedural way to tie everything 
up in knots to keep it from passing.
    Now, a bipartisan majority is poised to pass this bill. But now they 
are being blocked by legislative tactics concocted by the leadership 
that blatantly put special interests ahead of the interests of the 
American people.
    What is the result of this? The Republican leadership would ensure 
that the American people will have to wait for the right to see a 
specialist, wait for the right to have access to the nearest emergency 
room care, wait for the right to stay with their health care provider 
throughout a course of cancer treatment or pregnancy, wait for the right 
to hold their health plan accountable for harmful decisions.
    Again, I ask the bipartisan majority who favor the Patients' Bill of 
Rights: Don't make them wait. Reject these tactics. Insist that the 
leadership allow a fair up or down vote on the Norwood-Dingell bill. 
Insist on an up or down vote on a bill that is comprehensive, 
enforceable, and paid for. Don't let this 11th hour gimmick kill 2 years 
of hard work for something the overwhelming majority of Americans of all 
political persuasions know we need to do.
    The American people deserve more than partisan posturing and 
legislative gamesmanship on an issue this vital. The people who think 
it's the wrong thing to do ought to just stand up on the floor and vote 
against it. But they know they're in the minority; they shouldn't be 
able to pull some 11th hour deal that keeps the vote from coming out the 
way a majority want it to come out.
    Let me say, finally, we also should proceed with our actions to 
protect Americans from the threat of nuclear weapons. Later this 
afternoon, I'll meet here at the White House with Nobel laureates, 
former Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and others on the 
Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. I fervently believe, as all of you know, 
that this treaty will restrain the spread of nuclear weapons, while 
enabling us to maintain the effectiveness of our nuclear arsenal.
    As you know, there are discussions between Republicans and Democrats 
on the Hill about a better process for deliberating on this important 
treaty. After 2 long years of inaction, one week is very little time for 
considered action. The Chemical Weapons Convention, for example, that we 
ratified in 1997, had 14 full days of hearings in the Senate Foreign 
Relations Committee after a long process of negotiations. But for now, 
the vote is scheduled for Tuesday, and I will continue to aggressively 
argue to the Senate and to the American people that this is in our 
national interests.
    And I will have a little more to say about this later today at the 
other event.

Note: The President spoke at 12:10 p.m. in the Rose Garden at the White 
House.